Festos wrapped his arms around Theo, and leaned in. “Please.” It was more a breath than a word.
Theo touched Fee’s cheek. “We’ll go together.”
“Or you could let me take you home. Right now.” Festos gave Theo his most encouraging smile, but Theo shook his head.
“I can’t.”
I murmured to Kai. “Fee is still really worried about Theo undoing the ward that Zeus and Hades put up.” It worried me too. I knew it would be dangerous. Everything about this situation was dangerous.
But Festos’ expression was full of resigned heartbreak.
It scared me.
Kai kissed the top of my head. “Theo will be fine. Come on, I’ll swim with you.”
That was probably as good as things were going to get. I kicked off my shoes, really glad that my math skills were not up to calculating how much water per square inch of denim my jeans would soak up once we were in the water.
Fee went first. Since there was no gradual beach entry, he flung himself in. Then resurfaced, his cane thrashing the water as he howled “Cooooold!”
Theo, of course, stepped into the water with a minimal splash, swam toward Fee in a perfect front stroke, and wrapped his arm around him. “Stop wasting energy.”
Festos rolled his eyes, but stopped his melodramatic splashing. “Count of three. One, two, three.”
They ducked under the water and swam for the ledge. I watched until they were out of sight.
“Our turn!” I ended with a yelp as Kai swung me up in his arms. “Don’t. You. Dare,” I said.
He grinned and tossed me in the water.
I came up sputtering. My hair plastered to my face in long strands. As I swiped it out of my eyes, I felt Kai’s arms around my waist.
He pressed his face into the back of my shoulder and held me, both of us slowly treading water.
A minion rushed into the cave, all fire and fury.
“Hang on,” Kai said. He swung our bodies around so that I had no choice but to fling my arms around his neck.
A fireball sizzled past our heads.
I barely had time to take a deep breath as Kai dove under the water, taking me with him.
It was very dark. That didn’t matter so much since I decided that squeezing my eyes shut was a good idea. But I hadn’t taken a big enough breath. Actually, I don’t know if that would have been possible without transplanting a bigger set of lungs. As Kai dragged me through the frigid water, concern that the minions had found us, turned to concern that I might not have enough air.
Which turned to absolute certainty.
And progressed to burning panic as my lungs tried to explode. Or implode. Maybe both.
Until finally—on the verge of my “this is it, here I go, drowning now” moment—we broke the surface on the other side. I took an enormous gulp of air. Never had I been so thankful for the gift of oxygen.
Festos and Theo were already out of the water.
The portal light began to blink.
“Hurry,” Theo urged. “It’s closing.”
I let go of Kai so he could get out, but before I could go anywhere, fire shot up my ankle.
It appeared Pyrosim could not only swim, they could keep flaming in water, too. And grab on to people’s legs. It pulled me down.
The portal light blinked faster and faster.
I looked up toward the surface and tried to shake the minion free. Its other tentacle snaked around my waist. My T-shirt had floated up so his fire was in direct contact with my skin. My body jerked in pain. If I screamed, I would drown.
Enough of this.
I had no problem unleashing some fury on this minion right here, right now. I fired my light vines and spun the little bugger into oblivion.
Highly satisfying.
More minions poured through the tunnel. The closest Pyrosim stretched out its tentacles to grab my other leg.
There was a blinding flash. And not from me. Which meant the portal was closing.
I stretched my arm up and fired a vine, hauling myself out of the water and out of minion range. Just in time. I swung over the now-dark pool, breathing heavily. The portal had closed. With the minions trapped on the other side.
“The Temple of Demeter,” Theo said. “We’re safe.”
I lowered myself to the ground, avoiding the water. Not like I hadn’t brought enough of it with me in my clothes. I lifted the hem of my shirt to better see the tentacle damage. A lovely burn mark wrapped half-way around my waist. I touched it gingerly and hissed. It would heal but it still hurt.
“We match.” Theo sounded grimly amused.
I sent him a faint smile. “I beg to differ, Rockman. You got the magic salve. There’s no more marks on that pretty skin of yours.”
I wrung out my shirt. We were all sopping wet. I only spared one covert glance for Kai, to check and see if his already body-hugging outfit had gotten more defined.
It had.
Yum.
Nice as that image was, I was happy to see that Fee had a blazing fire going to dry us all out. Having the God of Fire and Volcanos around was pretty handy. I squelched my way over and sat down, enjoying the feel of the heat on my face. Now that I was momentarily safe, I relaxed enough to take in my surroundings.
We were in a cave. Empty of everything except a dirty floor. “How unspectacular,” I said.
“Well” Theo said wryly, “we’re essentially in an ancient doorway, so I’m not sure what you expected.”
“It doesn’t get much better,” Festos said. “We’re present-day again. The glory of this temple is long gone. All you’ll see are ruins.”
I looked toward the cave entrance to confirm his words. All I saw was Kai, framed in the frail pink light of sunrise, and staring outside.
“We’re not going anywhere yet.” Theo glanced at his watch. “It’s only 9AM.”
I stretched my hands toward the flame. “Are we safe here?”
He nodded, sitting down cross-legged beside me. “Yeah. We’re inside our ward, too. Not just theirs. Now we wait. We don’t want to appear too early and give them time to see us. Mess with our heads.”
I rested my head on Theo’s shoulder.
He relaxed against me.
Gawd, I loved him so much. How was I supposed to let him go? “I don’t think I can do it.” I didn’t mean facing Zeus and Hades, and Theo knew it.
“You have to, Magoo.”
My lip trembled and I bit down on it to keep from bursting into tears. Making Theo feel bad about our impending good-bye wouldn’t help him take down the ward. This was bigger than us.
Theo must have understood how much keeping silent was costing me, because he pulled me in and held me tight.
I sat there, enjoying our closeness.
No, memorizing it. Memorizing every last detail about him. How he smelled. How the knuckles of his right hand were weirdly more knobby than his left. How, without his glasses, I could see how deep and shining his eyes were.
But mostly, I just committed the feel of him to memory. So that on those days when his absence hit me like a physical ache, I could pull this time up and lose myself in it.
The fire hissed cheerfully. There was none of that woodsy smell I liked, since Fee had simply sprung it to life, but it sure was beautiful to watch.
We waited. The time would have been almost peaceful, except for Fee’s incessant pacing.
“Babe,” Theo said. “Sit down already.”
“I can’t. I’ll go mad sitting here for what, another nine hours?”
“Seven hours, thirty two minutes,” Kai said, barely turning his head. He seemed welded to the entrance.
Festos made another strangled sound.
“Okay, that’s it.” Theo gently disengaged himself from me and pushed to his feet. “Let’s go.”
Festos looked startled. “Where?”
“For a walk. We have some things to work out.” Theo turned to me. “You two stay here. Even though our ward is strong, I don’t wan
t you out in the open until it’s time. I’ll take down their ward a few minutes before the equinox. You know where the ritual happens, right?”
Kai finally moved from his position at the mouth of the cave and nodded. His eyes locked on to mine. “Yeah. The pomegranate tree west of here.”
My mouth fell open. The pomegranate tree in my vision was real, and about to become center stage for the showdown?
Screw. Me.
Twenty-two
“We’re performing the ritual under the freaking pomegranate tree?” I was incredulous.
Kai grimaced. “You didn’t know.”
“You think?” I brought my knees into my chest and then beat my head against them. “There’s a garden, isn’t there?”
“Not so much anymore.” Kai stuck his arm between my head and my knees. “Quit it. I don’t need you getting concussed.”
Instead of using them to beat myself senseless, I rested my head on my knees, this time pressing my cheek against my damp jeans to look at Kai more closely. “How did I not know this? I was the one who knew where the ritual was supposed to happen.”
“When did you start having the visions? How soon after you remembered?”
I’d been out of it for a while, healing from Bethany’s stab wounds. But the visions had started pretty much once I was back on my feet. “When Theo started getting the ritual details from me,” I said.
Kai nodded. “He never pressed you for more specific info on the location though, did he?”
“No. Why not?”
“Because back when you told us that we had to perform the ritual in Eleusis? We all knew exactly where. It was the only place near the Temple of Demeter that made sense. You did know,” he added gently. “Even if you didn’t, or couldn’t consciously remember it.”
I scratched at my jaw. “But you thought I actually knew and just wasn’t talking about it.”
Kai sat with his knees also to his chest, mirroring me. He propped a fist on top and rested his chin on his hands, staring into the flames. “Yeah. I mean, you were so freaked out by your visions. I thought that was part of the reason why.”
“No. They were disturbing enough on their own.”
He touched my arm, his face turned to mine. “It’s just a place. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means something.” I wrapped my arms tightly around my legs. “You weren’t in the vision. If things ended well and we did what we needed to, why weren’t you there? Why did I feel like I was dead? Or everyone was? Or both?” I gave a ragged laugh. “Ohmigod.”
Helplessness flashed across Kai’s face before he shrugged. “I don’t know.” He gripped my hands. “But I swear to you, Sophie, I won’t leave you.”
He had though. He’d left me back when we fought Delphyne, and he’d stolen Theo’s chain to go after Hades. He’d left me when Felicia told him about Persephone’s betrayal. Yeah, he’d come back but, not emotionally. Not completely.
I wondered if he held that crucial final piece of his heart back from me even now.
Sadness washed over me. My palms prickled. Not with rage, but nervous fear. Was Kai capable of loving me in the way I wanted? In the way I deserved? In the way I loved him? How much difference did me being human make to our fundamental understanding of how this relationship should go.
“What you thinking, Goddess?”
I tugged my hands from his. “You called me that, you know.”
He squinted at me. “What?”
“In Hades. You called me, Goddess. Well,” I laughed, kind of. “You called Persephone that. Seeing as you didn’t remember I existed.”
“Because of an enchantment,” he said, watching me carefully.
“Yeah, yeah. But see, I thought that was your name for me.” I was appalled to realize how much this mattered to me. My eyes misted up. “Not a left-over.” I waved at some smoke coming off of the fire, using it as an excuse to wipe my eyes.
“You have her memories.” Kai sounded exasperated. “Did I ever once call her that?”
I thought about it. “Not that I recall now, but—”
“Do you remember what I said that day when I first told you that I loved you?”
Every single word. “Maybe? What in particular?”
Kai’s amusement said he knew I was full of it. “That goddesses are easy. They’re vain and temperamental, but that I know how to handle them. When the truth was …” his voice twisted, “Seventeen years ago, Persephone was going to betray me. Kill me, for all I know, and I had no clue. No suspicion at all. I was totally played.”
“What’s your point?”
“I also told you that you were this mouthy human that I couldn’t figure out, and couldn’t make fall in line.”
I was starting to cramp in this position so I sat up, shaking out my shoulders. “Don’t forget how I kept getting under your skin,” I said.
“Trust me, I couldn’t forget that.” He straightened, and raked his hand through his hair. “These past few days? Five minutes with you and I knew something was wrong. You made me so angry and nothing about you was easy. It drove me crazy. I knew it wasn’t her. I called Persephone ‘Goddess’ for the first time ever because on some level, I recognized you.”
I wanted to believe him. He sounded sincere enough. Plus, he was giving me that look like I was chocolate and he just had to indulge his very serious sweet tooth.
Perhaps I could give him the benefit of the doubt.
I shifted so that I was facing him straight on and leaned in. I curled my fingers into his shirt and tugged him closer. “Kissing me is also so much better.”
He blushed.
It was simultaneously the sweetest and hottest thing I’d ever seen. My heart melted.
I kissed him.
Fireworks, earthquakes, fairy dust, it was all that and a heap of jaw-dropping magnificence.
“I love you,” I said against his lips.
He pushed me softly to the ground. His eyes heating up as he leaned over me. “So much and more. My phospherocious girl.” His voice was so tender.
Neither of us moved. Something profound had just shifted between us. The air itself felt weighted. Charged. Not with chemistry, but with something more real and scary and wonderful.
The heat was intense. And not from Festos’ fire.
This was the moment we should have had after Kai had first said he loved me. But maybe we had needed the misery of the past couple months to get here. Without the pain, we couldn’t have had the joy.
As I stared into Kai’s eyes, I was lost. My heart raced. Whatever this was, it was so precious. And I was suddenly so afraid. What if I’d finally gotten what I wanted only to have it snatched from me? What if the vision was right and soon I’d be dead, or alone or … “Kai—”
Kai shook his head. Almost violently. “Don’t talk.” He pressed into me for a kiss that was deeper and slower than any we’d ever had.
I was floating. Only the soft, gentle pressure of his fingers splayed against my stomach kept me from rising up and away. The kiss was sweet and heavy and longing. I trembled, twining my fingers into his hair to bring him closer. Make our two halves whole.
My skin flushed. My body tingled under the onslaught of this electrifying, spine-tingling, butterfly-inducing amazingness. Under this kiss of pure love.
Kai pulled away. “Try to sleep. We’re going to need all our energy.” He curved his body around mine, his hand resting across my waist.
I relaxed into him. I needed this. The rest, the closeness.
Us.
I woke up warm and sleepy, laying on my other side, still snuggled into Kai. We were face to face now. Our noses almost touching. He still had one arm flung over me and our legs were tangled up.
“Sleep well?” His voice sounded scratchy as his eyes crinkled in a smile.
I smiled back, too drowsy to speak.
He brushed the tip of his nose against mine. “You’re adorable when you sleep.”
I scrunched up my face and duck
ed my head, embarrassed.
Kai tipped my chin up with his finger. “You’re blushing.” He traced the curve of my jaw and along my throat.
I squirmed. “Well, you’re pretty cute when you sleep too.”
Kai propped himself up on his elbow. “You watched me?”
I mirrored his gesture. “Yeah. Back in Hades. You were beautiful, sleeping in the moonlight.” I looked at him, my heart in my eyes.
Kai ducked in for a kiss. A lovely wake up kiss.
“Ahem.” Festos cleared his throat.
I blushed for entirely other reasons and tried to twist out from under Kai.
He didn’t budge. “Go away.”
“Trust me, I’d love nothing more. But we have a problem.”
With a sigh, Kai rolled off of me. He got to his feet, held out a hand, and pull me up.
Festos strode over to me. He gave my shirt a sharp tug to straighten it and ran a hand over my hair, smoothing it down. “Just ratcheting down your wantonness,” he declared cheerfully.
I removed a twig from his hair. “Aren’t you in a good mood.”
He blushed.
Adorable.
“Follow the leader. I’m leader.” Festos pivoted and left the cave.
The air was cool and gray. What a surprise. Although, maybe, the sun really would come out tomorrow. Clear away our sorrows and all that jazz.
“What’s up?” I asked. I was glad I’d banked all that fireside time. Instead of feeling all goosebumpy, I was pleasantly cool. I stretched out my arms, feeling a tightness in my shoulders. “What time is it?”
“About 4:30,” Festos said. “We all crashed pretty hard.”
Theo stood in the distance on a slight rise, waiting patiently for us to arrive.
“I thought he didn’t want us out in the open.”
“Yes, well. Best laid plans blah blah blah.” We continued in silence until we had reached Theo.
I gasped. From this angle I could see that we stood inside an area ringed with flames. “What happened?”
“Hmm?” Theo peered at the fire. “Oh. No. That’s just their ward.”
“It hasn’t caused mass panic among the townspeople? That this ancient site is on fire?”
“They can’t see it,” Kai explained. “It’s magic. It doesn’t hurt them.”
My Life From Hell Page 26